Bank of America Wants To Get Out Of The Pizza Business

Bank of America has decided to stop selling pizza. The bank, which operates 1,140 Pizza Hut branches through its NPC International division, has reportedly decided to sell off the business. BofA could get more than $800 million for the Pizza Hut stores.
According to Bloomberg, BofA got the Pizza Hut franchises when it bought Merrill Lynch in 2009:

The bank inherited NPC in its 2009 takeover of Merrill Lynch & Co., which bought the pizza purveyor in May 2006 for $615 million, according to a filing. NPC was founded in 1962 and accounts for about one-fifth of U.S. Pizza Hut restaurants, the firm said in August. Its stores are spread across 28 states, mostly in the Midwest and South, with about 26,000 employees.
The price being negotiated may be a premium to what fast- food franchise operators typically trade for.

BofA is trying to sell off about $50 billion worth of assets. Bloomberg points out that CEO Brian Moynihan is doing that, in part, by “divesting assets deemed less important to customers.”